The Historical Jesus

[Sheldon]

The scholarship of Papias, Iraeneus, and Clement does nothing to prove the historicity of Jesus.

But ‘all of the secondary sources’ manifestly do NOT point in one direction. You simply think so because you’re invested in choosing only those sources that do.

I don’t think anyone here as claimed that all Christians, especially all early Christians, accepted the traditional authorship of the Gospels at face value. But the evidence is overwhelming that the vast majority of them have done exactly that.

And I’m absolutely sure than no one here claims that skepticism is a recent invention.

Boru

Have you ever wondered why so many early converts to this new religion were willing to accept the oral tradition of Gospel authorship?

No, since the claim is unevidenced, lacks context, and thus is purely anecdotal, but even were it not, it is clearly another bare appeal to numbers, an argumentum ad populum fallacy. The number of people who believe something, tells us nothing about that belief, least of all when they hail from an epoch of extreme credulity, superstition, and ignorance. 

The majority of Egyptians believed cats were deities, now do you find this anecdotal unevidenced claim a compelling reason to believe cats were, are, or could possibly be deities? 

"The scholarship of Papias, Iraeneus, and Clement does nothing to prove the historicity of Jesus." - Boru

You haven't explained to me why none of their accounts mean anything. Nor have you provided me with any sources to the contrary. 

I explained it, the methodology of verifying historical facts explains it, there is not one single contemporary source, beyond a common name, and fairly common execution of a political prisoner, there is no independent or corroborating evidence for anything in the gospel myths. 

Also, I wasn't responding to you, I was responding to Sheldon.

With a string of logical fallacies, and without offering one word of my post for context...

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Take poison? I thought they were drinking Kool-Aid. Or have you never had a beer before? Would if someone handed it to you and it wasn't sealed?

When it comes to cults I think they start with a highly intelligent and manipulative person who wants to lure people away and create his own private club.
These people willingly volunteer because he doesn't show them anything that would scare them away.... at first. It starts off as just a group of people, maybe a book club, maybe a martial arts club, but one by one these people are lured away by their own desires.

Perhaps this Cult leader has a way with women, perhaps he has money to offer in exchange for his servants loyalty. Little by little he tells them his secrets, convincing them that he is in on something that they can barely understand.

And then, when they least expect it, he throws a party for them and offers them free drinks, on the house? Who could refuse such a generous offer?

There’s a difference between someone handing me a full glass and saying, ‘Wanna beer?’ and handing me a full glass and saying, ‘Wanna a beer with cyanide?’

The rest of your post pretty neatly describes the rise of early Christianity. Well done!

Boru

[h311inac311]

A secondary source is still a source of information, and not all secondary sources are completely invalid.

Straw man fallacy, I made no such claim. The gospel myths are anonymous hearsay, beyond that I made no assertion. 

Just labeling everything that Papias, Iraeneus and Clement of Alexandria did as, "subjective speculation" doesn't make it so.

Another straw man fallacy, care to quote me making that claim?

And when all of the secondary sources point in one direction,

Argumentum ad populum fallacy. 

and you cannot provide me with any evidence to the contrary, then you are free to draw whatever conclusions you want to draw from that.

Argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacy, dear oh dear, were you planning to invoke every common logical fallacy there is? 

Assuming that all Christians merely converted to, and fundamentally accepted; all Gospels as being written by whomever they were told wrote them, with no ounce of critical thought, does not make it so. 

Sigh, straw man fallacy, I made no such claim. 

Some early Christians may have had this point of view, but Papias provably did not, and there were other early scholars which did not accept these writings "as is" without any amount of critical thought.

Appeal to authority fallacy. 

Do you guys really believe that skepticism is a recent invention?

No, do you believe scepticism of unevidenced supernatural magic, increases with objective knowledge of the natural world? careful now, a false equivalence fallacy seems to be the only fallacious card you haven't played here. 
Though your arguments here are relentlessly irrational, you haven't linked my post or quoted one word for context, so it's hard to say how accurately or honestly you addressed it.

"Another straw man fallacy, care to quote me making that claim?" - Sheldon

"There were early church fathers, such as Papias, who would refuse to acknowledge a writing as scripture if an author could not be identified. He ended up identifying all 4 Gospel writers. We also have some fragmentary manuscripts which identify some of the Gospel authors such as P 66 and P 4. We also have other 2nd century sources such as Clement of Alexandria as well as Irenaeus who both were able to identify all 4 Gospel authors. And, for some reason, all of these sources point to the same 4 names being assigned to the same four Gospels, exactly as our modern Bibles attribute them." - You can feel free attributing this quote to me, my name is Christopher; nice to meet you.

Now, in response to my quotation listed above ^ did you not respond with this? 

"The earliest copies are all unauthored, what you're talking about is subjective speculation." or do you want me to attribute this quote to someone else?
 

[h311inac311]

You have an interesting imagination.   Does the term 'love bombing' mean anything to you?

Thank you Angrboda, its one of the few things that I won't let adult-hood take from me.

To answer your question, yes, I know what that means, it is a form of manipulation where in which someone will intentionally overwhelm someone with compliments and positive affirmations, as well as gifts or the like.

It is a deceptive tactic which is used by someone who wants to seduce someone for their own nefarious ends, likely into doing something that they wouldn't otherwise want to do.

I myself have been caught doing this from time to time, however, I wasn't aware that I was doing it. 

Do you know what an avoidant attachment style is?

[Angrboda]

Can't say as I do. Feel free to explain.

[Ahriman]

I've love bombed people a few times, not maliciously though. As a teenager, I bought one of my female friends a $50 belt, and she hugged me and kissed me on the lips. That was $50 well spent....right?

[Sheldon]

Straw man fallacy, I made no such claim. The gospel myths are anonymous hearsay, beyond that I made no assertion. 
Another straw man fallacy, care to quote me making that claim?
Argumentum ad populum fallacy. 
Argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacy, dear oh dear, were you planning to invoke every common logical fallacy there is? 
Sigh, straw man fallacy, I made no such claim. 
Appeal to authority fallacy. 

No, do you believe scepticism of unevidenced supernatural magic, increases with objective knowledge of the natural world? careful now, a false equivalence fallacy seems to be the only fallacious card you haven't played here. 
Though your arguments here are relentlessly irrational, you haven't linked my post or quoted one word for context, so it's hard to say how accurately or honestly you addressed it.

"Another straw man fallacy, care to quote me making that claim?" - Sheldon

"There were early church fathers, such as Papias, who would refuse to acknowledge a writing as scripture if an author could not be identified. He ended up identifying all 4 Gospel writers. We also have some fragmentary manuscripts which identify some of the Gospel authors such as P 66 and P 4. We also have other 2nd century sources such as Clement of Alexandria as well as Irenaeus who both were able to identify all 4 Gospel authors. And, for some reason, all of these sources point to the same 4 names being assigned to the same four Gospels, exactly as our modern Bibles attribute them." - You can feel free attributing this quote to me, my name is Christopher; nice to meet you.

Now, in response to my quotation listed above ^ did you not respond with this? 

"The earliest copies are all unauthored, what you're talking about is subjective speculation." or do you want me to attribute this quote to someone else?
 

Just labeling everything that Papias, Iraeneus and Clement of Alexandria did as, "subjective speculation" doesn't make it so.

So we can see clearly that was not the totality of that particular claim you assigned to me, hence a straw man. Though the idea Iraeneus has objectively verified the authors of the four canonical gospels is dubious, since all the original texts were anonymous, subjective speculation seems a more apt description of such a claim coming from a bishop of the church in the second century. 

As well as focusing on one aspect of your assertion, and not the totality of what you assigned to me, you also have failed to address the other claims you wrongly assigned to me of course, and again you didn't in your original response quote my post for context, as it was difficult to assess how accurately you were responding to what I had actually posted, and not straw men like the one above. 

"The Gospel of Mark probably dates from c. AD 66–70, Matthew and Luke around AD 85–90, and John AD 90–110. Despite the traditional ascriptions, most scholars hold that all four are anonymous and most scholars agree that none were written by eyewitnesses."

CITATION

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

I've love bombed people a few times, not maliciously though. As a teenager, I bought one of my female friends a $50 belt, and she hugged me and kissed me on the lips. That was $50 well spent....right?

Not really. I’ve known places where you could get a helluva lot more than a hug and a kiss for $50.

Boru

[Fake Messiah]

I guess before talking about the historical Jesus we should first ask which parts of the Gospels are supposedly historical, but it seems that h311inac311 thinks that everything in the Gospels is historical.

[Ahriman]

I guess before talking about the historical Jesus we should first ask which parts of the Gospels are supposedly historical, but it seems that h311inac311 thinks that everything in the Gospels is historical.

None of it is historical because it didn't happen. Jesus' miracles were staged events (at best) and people don't just come back to life and ascend into Heaven, that's stupid.